Mozy or carbonite?

[oldskool21]

If not the right section just let me know. I am trying carbonite for the trial period runs good but doesn't back up my external hd which is always connected to my laptop. I was doing some research and found that Mozy will backup "fixed' devices ie external drives. i was looking for some feedback if you have these services or is there another service i need to look up and try out thanks.

 

[pparks1]

I'm concerned with sending my personal data somewhere else. I'm also concerned with the amount of upload bandwidth that I have. I just use a couple of external drives and keep at least 1 of them offsite.

 

[MattHawkins]

Beware of Mozy.

I backed up 30GB of data on my E drive. I installed a new DVD drive which windows allocated "E". Mozy then couldn't see all the data on "E" and decided to sync it ... ie all my backed up data disappeared. When I allocated E back to my hard drive Mpzy started backing up the 30GB ... from scratch.

I suspect Mozy might have been able to sort it but I don't expect this sort of issue with something I am meant to trust with my data. Bridge burnt.

I wrote about my negative experiences with Carbonite and Mozy here.

I was actually willing to pay for a solution but they both messed up.

I'm sure they are fine if you've got a small collection of knitting patterns or letters ... but anything over a few GB that you can't stick on a disc as well .. forget about it.

 

[striplar]

Carbonite.... Beware, this product may appear to work but in my experience falls far short of realistic expectations. I have this on two Windows 7 computers and they both have the same issues.
The initial backup went smoothly if a little slowly.
After a while, I double checked to make sure that my critical files had been recently backed up after being changed. Although some had, a lot of them had not.
I contacted Carbonite but their answer was pretty useless. All they say is that your backup is proceeding normally. Apparently they are unable to tell you what was backed up in the last 24 hours for example. All they can tell you is that since a particular date a long time ago, so many bytes of data have been backed up. Useless!
The log file which is accessible on each system is almost unreadable but with some perseverance, I found that it was trying to back up huge files recorded from the DigiTV card and loads of other unimportant stuff.
I then went through the whole computer and explicitly told it not to back up any of that stuff, only leaving the critical files and folders for it to back up.
It still doesn't work properly. Files are left in the 'pending backup' state for months until I tell them to be backed up ASAP.
I have fed this specific information back to Carbonite and they are not replying.
So the message is clear. If you want the comfort of the illusion of this kind of backup, Carbonite is for you. Just don't expect your recent data to be there when you system dies. At best, it's about as much useful as doing a complete system copy every few months.
If you think your Carbonite installation is ok then check out the backup status of a file that you know you changed a couple of weeks ago.
Besides the fact that it doesn't work, what is desperately needed is another icon in the Carbonite drive window that shows what was backed up recently. If this information was available, it would have been a lot easier to spot that things were horribly wrong.
In principle, this is a great idea. Now all they have to do is to make it work.